"Russia is stepping into a new age of uncertainty", said Pekka Sutela, a Finnish expert on the economies of Eastern Europe at the Bank of Finland. He was commenting on the implications of the recent arrest of oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky on corruption charges. Sutela sees signs that conflicts are being used to set up an authoritarian system in Russia.
"This means instability and changes that are somewhat difficult to predict. And business does not like unstable conditions."
One problem that Sutela sees is that the charges facing Khodorkovsky include events dating back to the privatisation process of the 1990s.
